kyatic's Reviews (974)

Pros: I genuinely learnt quite a lot of facts about Amish culture which will surely make me the most interesting person at any party.

Cons: absolutely cannot look myself in the eye ever again.

I read this one because I'm an absolute sucker for any book that's bold enough to put tank tops on the cover, and also because it's 2020 and there was Discourse(TM) about it apparently using the harmful 'gay for you' trope and I wanted to get enraged to distract myself from the terrible pain in my womb. Imagine my disappointment when it actually quite clearly had both protagonists reassess their sexuality about halfway through the book, with one of them actively exploring bi and pan identities and starting to identify as bisexual, using the dreaded B word itself, and the other one sort of settling on 'not straight, but who knows? Not me, and that's fine.' As someone who oscillates between those two camps myself, I wasn't mad at it.

This book had many things to get enraged about, including an unintentionally hilarious scene where someone picks up a severed arm and several mentions of people sharing a toothbrush before marriage, which should frankly be punishable by death, but it also had some of the best dialogue in any book I've read this year, which frankly I wasn't expecting from a book with two men in tank tops on the cover. The characterisation was consistent, the plot was interesting to me, as a person who reads more books about plane crashes and mountaineering disasters than is probably psychologically healthy, and there were several plotlines running through that were all tied up neatly, including one which I can only assume is based on Air Canada Flight 797 (look, I really do read a lot about plane crashes) and a really well-drawn narrative of inherited trauma and addiction. Much like Shrek, this book has layers.

Is it a clearly ridiculous book? I mean, yes; one of them is called Troy and the other one is called Brian, and they crash on a desert island and fall in love. Is it also incredibly enjoyable? Was I pleasantly surprised at the emotional nuance? Did I stay up until 2am to read it in one sitting? The answer to all of these is also yes, and I'm only half as ashamed of that as I should be. Instead of finding myself enraged, I actually found it a relatively decent depiction of two people realising later on in life (at the haggard ages of 26 and 39) that they were something other than straight, and I'm not sure it fits the 'gay for you' trope at all; more like 'straight before you.'

I did feel a bit like getting enraged at the amount of times the word 'hole' was used, but maybe that's my problem.

I absolutely loved this one. It was hilarious, the characters were great and felt very real, the chemistry was palpable, and reading all the astrology stuff didn't make me want to throw the book out of the window, which is actually a very high compliment because it usually makes me break out in hives. A few comments have said they wanted more from it in terms of a Pride & Prejudice retelling; I actually disagree. I liked that the parallels were few and far between. There are so many novels which follow the exact same narrative beats as Pride & Prejudice, and it always just makes me want to give up on those books and go and reread Pride & Prejudice. This one didn't. It's more of an homage to it than a retelling, and I think that's to its credit.

There are really few good f/f romcoms, particularly compared to the number of m/m romcoms on the market; I think RWRB sort of exploded the m/m romcom genre and f/f hasn't quite caught up yet. The Falling in Love Montage is probably the only other genuinely great f/f romcom I've read this year, and that was YA, so it was lacking the relatability of reading about characters my own age. I'd really love to see more f/f books like this one, where neither the rom nor the com suffers at the behest of the other, because I don't want to have to always default to reading m/m when I'm looking for a genuinely funny queer romcom. This is going straight on the 'to reread whenever you feel even slightly morose' list.

My only real criticism with this one is that the ending felt super rushed. It could have done with at least another chapter, I think; it ends on Christmas Eve and I feel like the potential to write a festive coda was missed. I also personally really dislike the 'two characters won't speak to each other but a meddling pal brings them back together' trope, but that's my own bias and it doesn't reflect on how I enjoyed the book at all; it makes narrative sense for that to happen within the context of the plot and who these characters are.

Sign me up for literally anything else this author writes, because I'm very much on board.

The good things about this book were the Scottish hijinx, the excellent dog, the fact that one of the protagonists makes a risotto, the funny spooks, the emotional spooks, the spooky spooks, the ADHD and PTSD rep, the hilarious female side characters, a boring man called Hugh, and the general lolworthy humour.

The bad things were mostly the way that most of the many, many, many, many sex scenes were written in a way that meant you couldn't always tell who was doing what to who, and sometimes it meant that I basically pictured them playing naked Twister with quite a lot of lube. Although, you know what, it brought me a lot of joy, so maybe that should go on the good list, too.

I really wanted to love this, because there's frankly nowhere enough romance novels with genderqueer characters, but alas. It read weirdly like every single character was a 14 year old on Tumblr in 2012, right down to the way that every queer person in the book wears rainbow bracelets and says "omigod" a lot, despite being nearly 30. I feel like this book could have really worked as a YA novel, with the characters aged down, because it had a lot of really valid and important things to say about consent and navigating relationships; it just doesn't work as an adult romance. I'd still recommend it for the representation aspect, but I don't think I'll be picking up the others in the series.

I read this purely because the cover is so awful that it made me literally snort tea out of my nose, but you know what? This book has everything. Ravishing, sand, Don Quixote quotes, brine, women swooning at saucy tales of pirates, more sand, impeccably researched Naval history, one man's journey to finally getting his ear pierced, incredibly salacious scenes, yet more sand, devilishly attractive Quakers, and planks. I am absolutely here for this book. I unironically love it and stayed up until 1am to read it in one sitting. I can't wait to read it all over again and also gaze upon that fantastic, dreadful cover with my own two eyes once more.

I really don't have an in-depth review on this one except to say that Dean is not a teenager. He's just not. He wears polo shirts and khakis and talks about 'adolescent ennui'. He is very clearly a 36 year old man. And that's fine in a book about 36 year old men, but if the author wants to write a YA - as he's clearly done successfully in the past! - he should possibly consider meeting a real life teenager. Also, this book could not be more clearly a blatant rip-off of RWRB; all of the plot beats are identical

Spoiler

kids of political figures are sworn nemeses, then they get trapped together, bond over the experience, become friends via texting / emails, then start dating, then get outed publicly when someone leaks their messages - it's the SAME PLOT

which seems a bit fishy to me, honestly. It was a relatively enjoyable read, bar all of the dodgy elements that other reviews have expounded in greater detail, but honestly, just read RWRB.

This needed about 20 extra pages at the end and also, realistically, more of an actual plot, but otherwise it's the funniest book I've read in about 900 years and just the best comfort read. I'm mostly mad that I can never read it for the first time again.